“New scientific findings suggest that a large comet may have exploded over North America 12,900 years ago, explaining riddles that scientists have wrestled with for decades, including an abrupt cooling of much of the planet and the extinction of large mammals…The period in question is called the Younger Dryas, an interval of abrupt cooling that lasted for about 1,000 years and occurred at the beginning of an inter-glacial warm period. Evidence for the temperature change is recorded in marine sediments and ice cores…” Full Slice

Access paper in PDF format

“…a chance encounter between spacecraft Ulysses and Comet McNaught’s ion tail has scientists…marveling at a stroke of luck and some surprising data…Instrument readings showed there was “complex chemistry” at play…Not only did SWICS detect unexpected ions in the comet tail, it found that the tail had a major impact on the surrounding solar wind…”We’re still in the process of figuring out what it tells us…We’re contributing part of the whole puzzle.”…” Full Slice

“…“Our findings suggest that lifespan regulation is linked to metabolic regulation…“The findings also suggest a tight connection between aging and diabetes. And we may have a new laboratory model for studying diabetes and other metabolic diseases.”” Full Slice

Nick Szabo’s blog is the first one I’ve mentioned, here on Baloney, that I specifically recommend.

Craig Venter’s genome is the first to have transcribed itself accurately and entirely into a completely different medium: this interactive, zoomable poster.

“…”The differences we observed were independent of other known risk factors for inflammation, such as health status, age, weight, and medication use. The changes were even independent of the objective size of a person’s social network. What counts, at the level of gene expression, is not how many people you know, it’s how many you feel really close to over time.”…” Full Slice

“Sea ice extent continues to decline, and is now at 4.42 million square kilometers (1.70 million square miles), falling yet further below the record absolute minimum of 5.32 million square kilometers (2.05 million square miles) that occurred on September 20–21, 2005…” Full Slice

“Planning for a summer delivery for your child? You might want to choose an ophthalmologist along with an obstetrician…Babies born in June and July had a 24% greater chance of becoming severely myopic than those born in December and January the group with the least number of severely myopic individuals…“It is probably a long-term effect of early-life exposure to natural light that increases the chances of a child becoming short-sighted…A more thorough laboratory analysis of myopia in young chickens suggested that the body has a mechanism that causes the eyeball to lengthen (short-sighted eyes are longer than normal) when it is exposed to prolonged illumination. This mechanism is associated with melatonin, a pigment secreted by the pineal gland, though scientists are not sure exactly how it operates. This is the same gland that sets our body’s internal clock or permits it to participate in “Circadian rhythms.”…” Full Slice

“Reduce, recycle and rebuild is as important to the most basic component of the human body, the cell, as it is to the environment.

And a [university] study shows just how much the body benefits when it “goes green,” at least if you’re a rat: Cutting calories helps rodents live longer by boosting cells’ ability to recycle damaged parts so they can maintain efficient energy production.

“Caloric restriction is a way to extend life in animals. If you give them less food, the stress of this healthy habit actually makes them live longer,”…” Full Slice

“Astronomers have spotted a space oddity in Earth’s neighbourhood - a dead star with some unusual characteristics.

The object, known as a neutron star, was studied using space telescopes and ground-based observatories.

But this one, located in the constellation Ursa Minor, seems to lack some key characteristics found in other neutron stars…Exactly what type of neutron star Calvera is remains a mystery…there are no widely accepted alternative theories to explain objects such as this that are bright in X-rays and faint in visible light…Calvera’s location high above the plane of our Milky Way galaxy is also a mystery. The researchers believe the object is the remnant of a star that lived in our galaxy’s starry disc before exploding as a supernova…” Full Slice

“…The team of scientists mapped over 1,500 square miles, exploring the deep sea creatures living in the depths of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. They used the latest technology to learn more about what is living in this remote and relatively unexplored deep-sea environment using remotely operated vehicles equipped with digital cameras.

With a suite of eight deep sea cameras they were able to capture images of life on the peaks and valleys of very rugged terrain. Colourful sponges and corals encrust rocky cliffs, whereas areas of soft sediment are populated by starfish, brittle-stars, sea cucumbers and burrowing worms. Fishes, crabs and shrimps forage over the ridge exploiting whatever they can find. Trawls, traps and corers have brought back thousands of specimens for study back in the laboratory…” Full Slice

“…“There is no indication of an MOC slowdown. And the large fluctuations explain why previously it was diagnosed that a slowdown had already happened. By chance, measurements were taken at a time when the MOC happened to be quite weak.”

With the instrument array it is feasible to monitor the annual average MOC to a resolution of about 1.5 Sverdrups, or about 8 percent of the mean value. This would be sufficient to detect any large, abrupt changes in the circulation, critical to planning for future climate change.”

“IT’S a speed record that is supposed to be impossible to break. Yet two physicists are now claiming they have propelled photons faster than the speed of light. This would be in direct violation of a key tenet of Einstein’s special theory of relativity that states that nothing, under any circumstance, can exceed the speed of light…The pair say they have now tunnelled photons “instantaneously” across a barrier of various sizes, from a few millimetres up to a metre. Their conclusion is that the photons traverse the barrier much faster than the speed of light. Full Slice

“…“In each ocean, water flows around anticlockwise pathways or ‘gyres’ the size of ocean basins…These gyres are the mechanism that distribute nutrients from the deep ocean to generate life on the continental shelves and slopes. They also drive the circulation of the world’s oceans, creating currents and eddies and help balance the climate system by transferring ocean heat away from the tropics toward the polar region.”…Completed as part of the BLUElink ocean forecasting project, this research provides the missing deep-flow connection between the Pacific and Indian Oceans. It has long been known that north of Australia a system of currents in the ocean’s upper 300m, called the Indonesian Throughflow, drains water from the Pacific into the Indian Ocean through the Indonesian archipelago – a process which influences Australian rainfall…Tasmania figures as a critical converging point providing a northern boundary to the mid-water funnel that is bordered at latitudes near 50°S…” Full Slice

“In the first large scale, multiethnic study of its kind, researchers…have confirmed the role played by three particular molecules known as cytokines as a cause of Type 2 diabetes, and further, have identified these molecules as early biological markers that may be used to more accurately predict future incidences of diabetes among apparently healthy individuals…” Full Slice